CH. XXIV. HALLER— ANATOMIST. 195 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



SCIENCE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY (CONTINUED). 



Childhood of Haller — Foundation of the University of Gottingen in 

 1736 — Haller made Professor of Anatomy — Haller's Anatomical 

 Plates — He discovers the power of Contraction of the Muscles — 

 Rise of Comparative Anatomy— John Hunter's industry in Dissect- 

 ing and comparing the Structures of different Animals — His 

 Museum and the arrangement of his Collection — Bonnet's Experi- 

 ments on Plants — Experiments upon Animals by Bonnet and 

 Spallanzani — Regrowth of different parts when cut off — Bonnet's 

 theory of Gradual Development of Plants and Animals — Anatomical 

 Works of Haller — He discovers the power of the Muscles to con- 

 tract. 



Haller, 1708-1 777.— Among the pupils of Boerhaave there 

 was one man who became, if possible, even more famous 

 than his master. This was Albert von Haller, son of the 

 Chancellor of Baden, who was born at Berne in 1708, and 

 died in 1777. Haller seems to have been a most extra- 

 ordinary child ; at nine years of age it is said that he knew 

 Latin and Greek, had made a Hebrew and Greek dictionary, 

 a Chaldean grammar, and an historical dictionary ! We 

 are not told how good these books were ; but how very few 

 boys of nine years old would have been able to write them 

 at all ! At seventeen Haller went to Leyden to study under 

 Boerhaave, and under Albinus, a famous anatomist ; and 

 at nineteen he was already a doctor of medicine. Having 

 been driven out of Paris because the people were horrified 



